Pump Vacation

I had the realization today that I haven't taken a pump vacation in well over 2 years. For about 750 days in a row, I've had this thing tied to me:
usually out of sight, but never out of mind.

Sure, I take it off for showers, swimming, sex, but it only adds up to a few hours a month.
It may only weigh a few hundred grams, but my insulin pump is one of the weightiest parts of my life.

I feel like I'm speaking very dramatically about it, which is a sure-fire sign that it's time for a pump vacation!

As I may have mentioned in the past, my biggest struggle in life is with apathy. At certain points, I've worked hard to adjust levels on my pump, etc, but I could not be further away from that at the moment. Going back to Multiple Daily Injections (MDI) will be great for reminding myself of the benefits I get from the insulin pump.
Or, maybe not.

Either way, I'm looking forward to tomorrow - waking up naked, untethered: nothing but me.

Welcome back, old friend

...or should I say, ENEMY!

I reconnected my insulin pump last night, and used it all day instead of my insulin pen.

Surprise, surprise, my sugars were between 14-17 mmol all last evening. I went to bed with my sugars still high-ish and woke up this morning at 3.2 - mmm, juice rarely tastes that delicious!

Anyway, after a day of elevated sugars, I concluded that it was a bad site and changed it a few hours ago, priming a few units into the new site AS I inserted it! In the case that my body is clogging the infusion set within moments of insertion, I'm not going to let it have the chance. I also started my basal insulin.

My sugars have been gently falling, so I'm keeping a tight eye on my sugars. I'm not sure whether that's still from the dinner insulin (3.5 hours old) or from either the priming or basal insulin from the new site. I'm hoping it's one of the last two so I can be sure that it's working. Nothing would make me happier than going to bed tonight knowing that I have a reliable infusion set going on.

For anyone wondering, I'm using the Sure-T set with the 6mm steel needle. Old school, I know, but it's quite comfy and I LOVE the short tubing!

I'm ready for a diabetes revolution! My latest A1C was 8.4, and that's simply not good enough. In fact, it's horrible. I'm doing everything I can to not feel like a horrible person - my essential laziness and apathy are putting my health at risk, and I just haven't been able to care (for longer than I'm willing to mention).

I've emotionally fought the issue of type 1 and type 2 diabetes through my formative years, being bitter that there's a similar condition out there that can often be avoided, or at least managed with healthy diet and exercise...

But look at me - I'm obese and lazy!

My TDD (total daily dose) of insulin is easily double what I should need for my weight - meaning I have hardcore insulin resistance, to the point that even if I wasn't type 1, I would have type 2 diabetes.

It's a catch 22 - the more insulin resistance you have, the harder it is to lose weight, for a bunch of reasons: 1)Insulin promotes fat. 2) The efficacy of insulin is greatly influenced by exercise (in complicated ways); it's extremely difficult to maintain stable sugars while exercising for me and I often have to use either food or insulin to correct.

It is depressing and ineffective when you have to intake more calories than you burn in order to keep your sugars stable! It's not just me, Kerri at SixUntilMe recently wrote about her struggles, and she's much fitter than I!

Long story short, I have an appointment with my endocrinologist on Monday and I'm going to broach the topic of introducing Metformin into my diabetes regime. It's a drug that is normally used for type 2 diabetes management, addressing insulin resistance rather than actually taking insulin. I'm hoping that this will help me to reduce the amount of insulin I'm taking. Also, if (as I suspect) my problems with new infusion sets is due to insulin resistance, my dreams would come true if the drugs solved that problem!

Anyway, I'd love to hear some feedback from any diabetics out there. I'll keep you posted!

Mr. Insulin Pump,

Why do you annoy me, even when I'm no longer using you?

I was trying to sleep peacefully this morning after my alarm went off. After a few minutes, I heard a faint beeping. Smacking my alarm again, I realized it was not the cell phone alarm. I assumed it was imagined, but then it kept going on.

Eventually, I realized it was coming from my desk drawer, where you were hiding.

I asked you what was wrong and you said, "OFF NO POWER".

Can't you just die silently? I promise, I won't shed any tears either way.

Sincerely,

Michael

This is precisely the kind of thing I was trying to avoid. I asked a forum on TuDiabetes for advice on what to do when not using a pump.

They failed to comprehend why anyone would not be using the god-like machine...

I was wondering if taking the battery out would result in losing all my settings and info from CGM, but no advice there. The responses chose to focus on trying to convince me to stick with the pump, or trying to speculate on why I was having problems, rather than helping me with the questions at hand.

back to Old Skool

I've been using the Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM) over the last week. I was hoping it would enlighten me as to what exactly is going on, but not so much. It just presents some of the mysteries more clearly.

I was using an expired sensor, so I shouldn't have expected perfection - it was actually more accurate than one of the sensors I used when I initially tried it- but as usual, I ended up chasing more frustrations than I was solving problems.

ALSO, not having your technology Mac /Apple compatible? NOT COOL Minimed/Medtronic - not cool! What is the point of having the CareLink stuff if I can't use it to analyze my information from this last week.

I'll have to use one of my friends' computers, but that is a terrible inconvenience for me!

I took an injection of Lantus half an hour ago. I took it in the bum (tee hee hee!), and it felt good. I haven't been able to use that area for infusion sets, because you sit on it all day; I forgot what good real-estate it was for injections. Also, the physical act of using a syringe is something I've missed - it felt good.

I can't even explain how excited I am to sleep without my pump - either figuratively or literally naked.

In other news, tonight I went to a delightful late Thanksgiving dinner with some friends from music school. It was hosted by a music theorist who has a columbian husband, so both of those demographics were well represented. It was tons of fun, great food, and good times all around.

A1C

I got my lab results back from early/mid September.

As usual, all of my levels are AOK except for the A1C.

I find an A1C of 8.4 to be very unsatisfying:

1) It's too high for all the effort I put in.

b) It's the exact same number I had last time! I don't even get the satisfaction of patting myself on the back for improving minimally, or self-loathing for getting worse.

It is probably the least satisfying because I've made a complete turnaround since starting the road trip in late August. I've only had one or two instances of my sugars shooting way up into the stratosphere when I change the site, compared to every time, before. I've cut my TDD nearly in half! I have to do the math, but I've been much less aggressive with my carb ratio, from 1 unit for 5 grams, to 1 unit for 7 or 8 grams of carbohydrate.

Nevertheless, these changes have only been in effect for a month, and that's not enough to significantly change the results of a three-month test. All I can do now is continue in this positive direction and hope for the best the next time around.

In other news, with the diabetes bloodwork, I also had some... err... other tests done - which all came back negative (phew)! Oddly enough, I've always romanticized the idea of going crazy from syphilis: how so many composers of the past died. Nevertheless, I suppose it is better to not die, regardless of how artistic the cause might be...

In the never-ending saga, I found out that by requesting my medical files from the doctor in London, I am no longer his patient, thus no longer eligible for Ontario coverage. The pharmacy in Ontario has indeed put my order through, thankfully. They will send it tomorrow and I will have my last free drugs until I am set up with B.C. Healthcare.

Let's hope they send enough to last until then!

2nd post in one night

Wow, 2 in one night - I'm awesome!

I've fallen in love with the strawberry flavoured black tea I'm drinking - it's amazing!

Diabetes over the trip has been interesting. I've needed less and less insulin - especially since getting to Vancouver. I might need to change my carb ratios, but there's just too much to think about to get things very organized.

ALSO, I need a reliable meter in order to make real changes.

[Time for a rant]

Who the fuck decided that measuring whole blood was a good thing?!? Especially without a reference chart! I'm not sure if they think you're actually supposed to treat these the same as plasma numbers, but they're not! I don't even know the brand of meter I've been using, but it's the medtronic sponsored one that communicates with my pump. When I first tested the meter, I noticed that my sugars were always about 2 mmol over ALL my other meters (3 of the 4 were super close, but not this one). I went through the customer support and they verified that my meter was working and that whole blood is usually higher than the previous type of testing. Long story short, I was told to just use the meter and trust what it said because they're results are more accurate than any other meter I've ever used.

The only time that meter has read under 7mmol this last week or 2 has been when I was sitting on my new kitchen floor right before chugging back a glass of orange juice, in a cold sweat and fumbling with the strips. My glucose at that moment was 4.4 (before juice). YA RIGHT!

The only reason I've been using the strips is because, moving across the country, I can't afford to waste the strips. I've been assuming that I should just add 2 to every number I get and that seems to work fine.

Anyway, I'm back on my favourite meter - I'm plugging it now - the LifeBrand blood glucose meter. It's super cheap (60% of the cost) and the meter is attached to the strip bottle and can be discarded after each use.

The only problem is the excessive amount of packaging that it comes in. You need utility scissors to open it up and then it's all jagged - basically it can save you the hassle of using a lancing device....

Ok, that's enough rambling. Good night!

I have been functioning on the principle that my body just needs more insulin while I'm sick, so everything else should be the same.

I tried to exercise at home yesterday, doing things pretty much the same as usual. I disconnected while getting ready, after testing and mu sugars are happy in the 6.3 region. Long story short, 10 minutes into the workout, I was feeling sloppy and weak so I tested. 2.8! Spilling the remainder of my fridges juice on my face and not into my mouth, I took refuge with a honey packet before heading downstairs to buy more juice (and oreos and diet coke).

I'm not sure if it's just because I have extra insulin going around inside me, or maybe it was because I had eaten and bolused for lunch only an hour or so before, but this was not a good situation.

I hate the fact that, while I want to exercise and get in shape, I seem to have an endless supply of excuses not to.

Excuses aside, I'm going to try again right now.

Eerily, I just tested and my sugars are 6.3 again. I'm going to disconnect AND eat an oreo or two and see how that works.

I'll post a little later this afternoon, maybe.

One of my biggest pet peeves is when I have an otherwise perfectly working infusion set that gets accidentally ripped off well before it was due to be changed!

Desk corners, door knobs, and shirts - I'm looking at you!

Doctor's Appointment

After three months of being on the insulin pump, my A1C was 8.6 - higher than it had been, but that was expected with the shitty control that starting the pump had caused.

In theory, those months are behind me. I should have a substantially lower A1C because I've been on the pump for a while and those problems should have been ironed out.

Today's A1C was 8.4. This confirmed my feelings that things haven't actually improved. With my sugars shooting up every 2 or 3 days, it's still causing the overall situation to be bad.

What does my A1C mean?

I'm 1.4 higher than the standard target for diabetes management.

That means I'm 14% more likely to have diabetes complications than they would like me to be.

That means I'm 24% more likely to lose a limb or go blind or kidney damage than a non-diabetic.

It frustrates me, because I was moving towards that target range when I was on MDI, but now insulin pumping is putting me back in the wrong direction.

Anyway, the worst part of my appointment was the fact that my endo had absolutely no knowledge of why my infusion sets might not be working for a few hours after inserting them

His only suggestion was that most of his patients only use their abdomen and they never have those problems. I explained to him that it happens in my abdomen as well, but that didn't change is suggestion.

This is unforgivable! I can understand that he might not have come across that in his own practice, but he wasn't even willing to think diagnostically about it - he just told me that I should talk to my pump educator, and that I should ONLY use my abdomen. That is a blatant contradiction to what every diabetes educator and pump information source I've ever read has said.

Passing the buck - sucks!

Infusion Site Review: Right Arm

I managed to find 5 infusion sites on my right arm which saw me through about 2 weeks.

Not completely related to diabetes... one day I became startlingly aware of how little upper body strength I have when I tried to do push-ups and failed miserably.  Since then, I've been doing them everyday before my shower, systematically increasing the number each time they seem easier.  I do them with my arms on the bathtub so they are easier because the angle is lesser (Yes, I realize that this means I'm doing girl-pushups, but I'm fine with that!).  Within a few weeks, starting at 5 pathetic ones, I can do 25, and still increasing.

I'm certainly not buff, but I'm realizing that my arms have more muscle mass in them than most other areas of my body.  Because a lot of the infusions sites hit muscle, a lot of them resulted in 'pooling' where it takes a few hours before the insulin is absorbed and works.  I only had one out of the 5 sites that did not have pooling, and that site was problematic for completely other reasons: adhesion!

The site that had no pooling and had really good absorption didn't even last 2 days.  It dislodged overnight and I woke up with ketones.  That site was on the back of my arm, close to the armpit.  I don't have problems with adhesives, so I'm thinking that this problem was because my antiperspirant was interfering - each time I applied, it would hit the plastic nub on the site.  Or, it could be due to sweat, which is also quite likely.

In general, comfort was ok.  The tubing has a way of creeping upwards, which can feel a little tickly when you have a bunch of tubing conglomerating at your armpit.  Because the tubing is so long, I have to wear an undershirt at night to keep it in place, otherwise arms and legs and other appendages might get caught in it .

In general, the arm went well.

I put in a new site last night in my right upper back.  I imagine I'll be able to get at least 6 sites out of my back, so here goes another few weeks or a month.

Life seems to be going pretty well these days.  The summer is already slipping by and surprise, surprise, I've done nothing.

I'm working, that's it.  The people at work are great and we're having lots of fun both in and out of the office.  The downside to that is that I'm spending a lot - too much money.

Part of me wants to be doing lots of great, worthwhile things this summer - reading books, listening to loads and loads of music and writing piece after piece so that I am really prepared to start a doctoral program next year.  The other, more powerful part of me, senses that after spending the last 7 of 8 years in university, I am about to embark on another 4 years - I need a little break.  I liken it to those weeks of summers growing up where there were no activities planned, your parents were working and you just had to amuse yourself - it was like recess all day long!

That's not to say that I'm completely wasting my time.  I'm still playing some piano, though the practicing has lessened.  I'm still learning the Scriabin piece as well as a Shostakovich Prelude and Fugue in B-Minor.  There are actually a lot of pianists at my office job, so it's fun to talk about piano rep and that kind of piano-nerd stuff.  

 

Diabetes control is pretty damn good.

I've been extra good about writing all the details of my infusion sets in my calendar book so that I keep a good record and can track patterns.  I've actually found more spots on my arm than I would ever have thought - half of them have had some trouble with pooling the insulin before absorption, but I am fine with using my insulin pen to avoid the BG jump.  I will use one more arm site and then I'll move to my lower back.

Things are looking up!

The weather is beautiful and downtown is bustling with people!

I picked up my personal copy of my thesis today.  It looks so professional and perfectly bound and all that.  I am very happy with it.  Oh yes, did I mention I got it bound in orange!?!? I LOVE IT!

I'm sure you noticed, but I was getting very upset with my pump and infusion sets.  I actually called the pump companies tech support line; I was at the end of my rope and if they didn't have a good solution for me, I was ready to go out and buy a bottle of Lantus right after the phone call.

I didn't get either, really, but I got a supportive dose of reality and a wonderfully friendly voice at the other end of the line. 

I had asked my nurses and doctors what the problem was with things, but they had no answers.  One nurse said she'd look into it, but I never heard back. [I'm not impressed with Ontario's Health Care, yet again.]  When I explained my symptoms to the tech support nurse, she definitively told me that I must be shooting into scar tissue.  She was patient with me and explained it over and over again until I understood and let down my stubbornness enough to accept it.

She explained: the reason the new sites don't work is because the insulin doesn't work in that area and it take a while for it to pool enough to spill over into a new area that accepts the insulin; steel needles vs canulas will not make a difference; site rotation needs to be my main concern.  She suggested a plan that will maximize the time that areas of my body will have to heal before being injected into again.  

Rather than going back and forth between left and right like I have, stick with one side of the body for a month and a half - if I can find about 15 different spots (at least 2 inches apart from each other) on each side of my body, then it will take a month and half to make it through each side, working logically like top to bottom.  By the time I go through the other side of my body, each site will have had 3 months since it was last punctured-more than enough time to heal.

Her logic was impeccable and that is the best way to appeal to me.  She pointed out that this is not an immediate solution; it will take a while to get into this and it won't cure previous scar tissue, but it will minimize the appearance of new scar tissue and work out for the best in the long run.

She said she would send me some samples, encouraging me to go back to the newer canula infusion sets.  I was overjoyed the next morning to realize that she had sent me 30 sets... that's 3 months worth!!  Now I'm in it for the long haul again.  I will stick it out for another 3 months from now and see if things are any better.

Of course, I will update as we go along!

It's been a slow week for blog-worthy news.

Switching to the steel needles has been good and bad:

The sugars have been more stable.  Changing the sites has had NO effect on sugars or absorption.  There was one site change that didn't take, but one out of twenty is not bad odds!

My stomach, however is not looking so hot.  I've been bad at remembering exactly when I last changed the site.  If I get too close to the 2 day mark, or over that, the site gets really inflamed.  Because I need to change the site so often, and I can only use my stomach due to needing 2 hands to disconnect, my stomach looks a little like a battle zone.

I ordered a different type of steel needle infusion set - I am expecting them in the mail tomorrow.  Hopefully, they will be manageable with one hand so that I can use my arms and lower back again.

I am actually starting to evaluate the insulin pump's presence in my life.  I honestly don't know how I feel about it yet. 

I HATE HATE HATE having it connected to me.  I thought that I would get used to having it at my side, but it drives me insane.  I can't even fully describe how it makes me feel; words aren't enough.  

Ok, I do know how I feel.  I hate the insulin pump and I want to rip it off of me and out of my stomach and throw it out of the window.  Fuck all these diabetics who talk about the freedom that they get from the pump.  Freedom is being able to take ONE Needle a day and know that even though your sugars won't be perfectly stable, you can survive for 24 hours without eating or bolusing.  The insulin isn't just a piece of technology that is attached to you, it is a manifestation of how diabetes takes up every waking moment of your life.

Ignorance was bliss.

Before the pump, things were going fine.  There was room for improvement, but I was doing well.  Now, this type-A diabetic personality has been introduced into my life - the people who are finiky about every moment of their day and their sugars.  I do not do well with that lifestyle, so the pump makes me aware of how delinquent I am as a diabetic.  

I've grown accustomed to the ability to lower my basal rate for exercise and other forms of strenuous activity.

Long story short, I will not switch off the pump just yet...

Why?

Spite and Money!

It was too much effort to reach this point, that I'm going to make it worth my while.

I have no coverage anymore, so I really just can't afford to go back to my old insulin.

But also, mostly spite.

In conclusion, I hate being diabetic these days.

Go here.

It's been a while since I've knit anything, but now I'm back at it.  I also knit another one besides the one up for auction.  I'll probably put it up for auction as well -  it's a little more seductive than the first.

I'm starting to do my taxes, but I'm missing one of my T4 slips.  Other than that, I have all the other information.

I had a meeting with another pump nurse the other day.  Long story short - she says things aren't good enough and wants to start fresh.  I told her I didn't feel comfortable with the process we went through the first time, so I want to try doing fasts to set basal rates rather than messing around with guess-work.  She is willing to help me with it, so that's what I will be doing over the next while.  I'm starting with overnight testing which doesn't involve any extra fasting because you don't eat while you sleep.

The problem with doing an 8 hour fast is that it can only start once the food and insulin is completely out of your system, ie 4 hours later...   This means that I should be fasting for the first 4 hours of my waking life as well, rather than just the 8 hours of sleeping.  I'm not a big breakfast person anyway, so it shouldn't be too difficult.  The other problem is that my sugar has to be stable before going to bed, meaning I can't eat or take insulin for 4 hours before going to bed.  oy!

Metal pokey things don't like me today.

2 separate things that didn't go so well today:

1) I have an endocrinologist appointment next week, so I went to get blood taken today.  The lab tech poked around inside my left arm for a fair while, almost enough to make me mildly queasy, but it didn't bother me.  Eventually she gave up and asked if I had ever had it taken from my hand.  This took me back to the olden days!  Up until I was about 18, they took the blood from the back of my hand with a butterfly needle.  It filled me with warm fuzzies.  But no!  Rather than the back part of my hand where they were always successful, she shot the needle right above my index knuckle - it's dark and a little bit bruisy.

2)I had been wanting to try a new infusion site for a while - the arm!  I couldn't up until now because the tubing seemed just not quite long enough - it could reach from my arm to my pocket, but not if I reached for anything...  In my latest shipment of medical supplies, I got the longer tubing set - not just a bit longer, but nearly twice as long... I'm dangling a fair bit!

Anyway, some things are difficult to do with one hand - clapping, tying shoes, etc.  Well, inserting an infusion set is DEFINITELY one of those things!  It doesn't help that I was using the more difficult of the two infusion sets - with the Silhouette, you can't remove the adhesive backing before using the insertion device like you can with the Quick-set.  If you try, the stickiness gets stuck to the device and that's hard to fix even with both hands!

I got it all set up and the insertion went fine, but then I had trouble removing the set from the device.  Trying to remove it was a terrible mess, I was accidentally moving the needle all around inside my arm...  I got frustrated and pulled it out and reinserted it by hand.  Much better, BUT then I was having trouble taking the adhesive backing off with only one hand - all of this is taking place on the back of my left arm.  The tugging at the set to get the backing off was, once again, not appreciated by my arm.

Long story short, I got it in and stuck!  It is a little tender, but oh well.

My sugars were a little higher than they should have been before putting in the new set, so of course my sugars sky-rocketed after the first bolus...  The sugars are moving down, giving evidence that the insulin IS working, but not as fast or effectively as I would like.  Nevertheless, I have no ketones and I'm comfortable going to bed with it in. 

After all that hassle, I'm damn well not wasting this one until it has proven itself useless!

I'll be leaving EARLY Friday morning to go into Toronto for business and pleasure.  I have a meeting with my thesis adviser and then I will be visiting with wonderful friends for the rest of the weekend.  I'm not sure how long I will be staying - it will depend on how inspiring and invigorating I find Toronto to be this time around.

The thesis is coming along.  I finished some of those ground-work chunks and I've been doing some of the creative stuff the last few days.  It isn't as immediately rewarding as I had hoped, but it is still getting better.

I haven't shampooed my hair since the day I got my haircut - a week.  As a result, my hair has become dull and flat.  I've always had straight hair, but never flat; it's lost all of it's volume.  While I don't want to have oily hair anymore, I don't want this!  I'm going to shower and shampoo my hair in about 10 minutes and I'm going to start a cycle of shampooing every 3 days.  I hope I haven't screwed things up - I always liked the way my hair looked, just not the oiliness.  

While I had finished my reading score and handed it in on Thursday morning, I have still not finished the parts.  This is the problem with working really well to deadlines - the deadlines of others are far more convincing than the ones that one sets for him or herself.  I had told myself to get them done on Friday so I would be finished, but in reality, they aren't due until Tuesday before the reading.

Anyway, I will finish that up today and get the scores bound; I've wasted enough time already.

I've been flip-flopping a lot on how I feel about the reading.  I feel like I did not prepare enough and could have put a lot more information into the score.  I also am on the verge of making large-scale unwarranted judgement calls on the piece, simply because I haven't heard it yet.  I also haven't met with my adviser in a long time, so I'm craving some outside opinion.  I am a little scared of the fact that he has never seen any of the second movement, and it will be played at the reading.  I am also a little anxious that he might not be able to make it to the reading, not that that would be the worst thing ever, but he knows more about working with a conductor and general practical concerns.  Anyway, in the end I'm really looking forward to hearing some things and learning about whether or not they work.

The pump is getting noticeably better all the time.  I am currently trying out a new infusion site in the side/back of my left thigh.  I suppose this could be referred to as one's "nass".  Luckily, I picked the right section of the nass, so I'm not sitting on it or bumping it much.  Today, the absorption seems to be good, whereas last night it took even longer than normal for the absorption to start.  That was likely because my sugars were high to begin with, so I won't hold it against this site in particular.

I've been drinking alcohol more often lately, so that has been interfering with sugars as well.

In other news, I'm now finally officially feeling like a grad student.  I make just barely enough money to live off of, this means that when I want to go out and party or spend money, in theory, I have to make adjustments to everything else.  Unfortunately, I have been bad at that this last year and I have opted to not make the necessary adjustments.  Macbook, holiday travel, drinking and eating out more than I should have left me where I am today - finally experiencing student debt.  On one hand, this is terrible for me - I had always been relatively in control of my money and debt was a very minor presence.  On the other hand, that was when I lived at home while attending undergrad; every friend I knew who lived away from home had a huge debt load after undergrad, and my worst-case-scenario debt this year still pales in that comparison.  For the rest of this year, I'm going to smarten up and fly right.

I'd still say I'm a pretty happy-go-lucky guy, but nowhere near as much as I used to be.  Stress has definitely made a home for itself in my life.

This week is a week of deadlines.  Yesterday, I had to get the piano part to my pianist so she can learn it for the reading in a week today; this meant I had to finish the piano part.  I spent the entire morning and afternoon at the computer to finish it, and on the bus to take it to her, I noticed mistakes and things that I need to change.  I ended up rewriting an entire section last night and re-delivered it to her today.

It was so hard to focus on just the piano part when there is so much to do with the orchestra, but now I get to focus on the orchestra because the deadline to get the score to the conductor is Thursday.  Today and tomorrow will be two more days of intense writing so that I make the best use of the reading session.

With stress, comes even more erratic eating habits, which I didn't quite notice until I got an email from my pump nurse yesterday saying that she couldn't use any of the information I had sent her from the previous week because it was too speckled with snacking and drinking and general randomness.  On the bright side, she said we're getting quite close with the pumping so I should just buckle down - if I can eat just three solid meals a day and get the appropriate blood glucose readings to go along, we should be able to finalize things this week, maybe.  We are both getting quite apologetic; she fears that she's being an annoyance, while I fear that I'm taking up too much of her time.  We both need to do this for a little longer and then things will be all good, I just hope that I haven't overstayed my welcome as a new pump trainee.

Ooh, I almost forgot to mention.  Every time I get a haircut, I think about not shampooing my hair for a while so that I can methodically slow down the oil production of my scalp.  Without fail, I last a day or two and then I start shampooing daily again.  This time, I thought to put my shampoo under the bathroom sink, so I won't be able to shampoo, even if I want to.  I still rinse my hair daily, but I'm sure that takes away less of the natural oils than shampoo does.  Anyway, I'll keep you posted on how the hair is going every couple of days!

Well, I hadn't done it for quite a while, but I started back at it the other night. I stayed up until 5am on tuesday because of it.
I knit.
My new macbook inspired me to knit a case for it. I'm not the type that would waste my money on a case, especially when I can make one myself.
Therefore, here are pictures of the computer and its new home.


There's nothing really special about the pictures of the computer itself, you can get a nicer look at the computer and its features on the promotional website, but there you go anyway.

Below are pictures of the case I've spent several hours of procrastination time making. I haven't finished it yet, I need to sew the back of the apple logo together at the back so it doesn't stretch so much.
Also, I made it a little too small - it fits nice and tight so the macbook is safe and sound, but the stretch is especially noticeable with the logo. Once again, sewing it together at the back will fix that slightly, but hmm.. only time will tell.














In other news, I haven't gotten the gleaming results I've wanted from the pump this week. I meant to fast during the afternoon sometime this week, but it just didn't fit into my schedule. Tomorrow, I have my last phone meeting with my nurse, so hopefully she will have some helpful advice.
I leave on Saturday and will be spending the rest of the month out West. I will be treating it like a pump vacation for bits of it. In order to get a clear picture of my insulin's function, I haven't been allowed to correct for high sugars this last few weeks, but I will be taking care of that while away. Hopefully, this will remind me of the goodness that the pump promises. So far, it hasn't delivered what it is supposed to be able to do. I realize that I need to work at it, and I have, but it has been less than inspiring thus far.

Also, tomorrow I have my last meeting with my thesis adviser before he goes on sabbatical, and though I will still meet with him next term, I want to make the most of it. With that said, I haven't written enough for tomorrow, so I'm off to do that!

Meet the newest part of my life. I haven't named it yet, or even decided on a gender, but I should introduce it nonetheless.

It appears I have some diabetic readers now that I have started writing about my pump, so welcome one and all!
I hope that my experiences are helpful to you, and feel free to ask questions about anything - I'm always looking for useful topics to write about.


Here are two pictures of my new pump. I hate taking pictures - with the flash(above) it whites out part of the picture, and without (right) you can't hold it still enough so you get a blurry picture. Anyway, combining the two will give you all the detail and perspective you could desire!

I've been absent minded today - forgetting to take my two-hour glucose tests right on time, forgetting to check my sugars before starting to eat. These little things will make the process a little more complicated, but I think I can deal.
There are just a lot of things to get done at this time of year!

I talked to my nurse today after having emailed her my blood sugars from the first two days. She says that I'm doing quite well! We've adjusted the amount of background insulin that I'm getting overnight because my sugars keep dropping overnight. Other than that, we agreed that it's best to not make other changes for a little while because it's only been a few days. We will talk again on Friday and see if we need to make any changes then.

I've started using a really cool feature of the pump - a square wave bolus. Basically, it delivers the insulin evenly over a time span. These are perfect for high carb foods with a low GI value. On injections, these kinds of meals were nearly impossible - they would need a lot of insulin so if I took it too early, my sugars would drop before the food was absorbed, the liver would shoot out some glucose of it's own, and then the food would be absored, so my sugars would end up high a few hours later. If I dosed too late, the food would spike up my sugars, and then it would take forever for them to come down. I was able to eat fast food today and not feel like shit because of it! Well, fast food still makes you feel icky, but non-diabetes related ick!